If you would test the soul of a friend, take him into the wilderness and rub elbows with him for five months. Either you will hate each other forever afterwards, or emerge with contempt tinged with a pitying toleration — or you will be close, unquestioning friends to the end of your days.

Draken Slayer is a dark fantasy fiction short story, part of the Shadows of Illyria: Tales from the Realm Series. Written by author JM VanZuiden, the Shadows of Illyria Series is a unique twist on fantasy fiction, incorporating his real-world combat experience into the characters and events of an epic fantasy world. Draken Slayer is told a flashback suffered by the main character of the Shadows of Illyria series of novels, Aldric. In his nightmare, he relives his a life-changing event from the past where his unit was tasked hunting a pack of dangerous Draken (dragons), and experience the inglorious thrill and devastation of real combat, and the loss that comes with it.

In the isolated, desolate, and decrepit village of Dunwich, Massachusetts, Wilbur Whateley is the hideous son of Lavinia Whateley, a deformed and unstable albino mother, and an unknown father. Strange events surround his birth and precocious development. Wilbur matures at an abnormal rate, reaching manhood within a decade. Locals shun him and his family, and animals fear and despise him due to his odor. All the while, his sorcerer grandfather indoctrinates him into certain dark rituals and the study of witchcraft. Various locals grow suspicious after Old Whateley buys more and more cattle, yet the number of his herd never increases, and the cattle in his field become mysteriously afflicted with severe open wounds…

For many years, the narrator and his uncle, Dr. Elihu Whipple, have nurtured a fascination with an old abandoned house on Benefit Street. Dr. Whipple has made extensive records tracking the mysterious, yet apparently coincidental, sickness and death of many who have lived in the house for over one hundred years. They are also puzzled by the strange weeds growing in the yard, as well as an unexplained foul smell and whitish phosphorescent fungi growing in the cellar. There, the narrator discovers a strange, yellowish vapor in the basement, which seems to be coupled with a moldy outline of a huddled human form on the floor. The narrator and his uncle decide to spend the night in the house, investigating the possibility of some supernatural force.

In the North Atlantic, after sinking a British freighter and its occupied lifeboats, the cruel and arrogant Altberg commands his U-boat to submerge, surfacing later to find the dead body of a seaman who died clinging to the exterior railing of the sub. A search of the body reveals a strange piece of carved ivory. Because of its apparent great age and value, one of Altberg’s officers keeps the object, and shortly thereafter, strange phenomena begin to occur…

Bran Mak Morn, King of the Picts, vows revenge on the Roman governor Titus Sulla after witnessing the crucifixion of a fellow Pict. He seeks forbidden aid from the Worms of the Earth, a race of creatures who were once men but after generations of living underground have become monstrous and semi-reptilian. He secures their help after stealing a religious item of theirs from a barrow, trading it back in return for them delivering Sulla to him for a battle to the death. However, Sulla’s mind is broken from his contact with the horrific Worms of the Earth and Bran Mak Morn slays him in mercy rather than vengeance, realising that some weapons are too foul to use, even against Rome.